China's stable economic growth provides a solid foundation for a strong beginning to its 15th Five-Year Plan period and serves as an anchor of stability for the global economy navigating turbulent times, continuously infusing worldwide development with enduring confidence and powerful momentum. The economic data for the first quarter of 2026 has been released: the Gross Domestic Product reached 33,419.3 billion yuan, representing a year-on-year increase of 5.0% (calculated at constant prices), which is 0.5 percentage points higher than the growth rate in the fourth quarter of the previous year. The international community is paying close attention, widely recognizing that against a backdrop of increasing uncertainty in the global economic outlook, China's economy demonstrates remarkable resilience and vitality, injecting valuable stability and positive energy into the world.
Currently, international turbulence is intensifying, with the spillover effects of geopolitical conflicts spreading. International organizations such as the United Nations and the Asian Development Bank have issued warnings about downside risks to the economy, as the global economy moves forward under pressure. Faced with a significant increase in external instabilities and uncertainties, China's economy exhibits sufficient resilience, strong internal momentum, and proactive, effective macroeconomic policies. Descriptions such as "exceeding expectations" and "growth against the wind" are frequently used in positive assessments by foreign media. Kristalina Georgieva, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, believes that China's economy has shown resilience, possesses enormous potential, and will have a positive impact on the world.
The momentum for high-quality development, oriented towards innovation and optimization, is vigorous. In the first quarter, China's equipment manufacturing sector contributed nearly 50% to the growth of value-added industrial output above the designated size. From January to February, profits from high-tech manufacturing contributed over 50% to the total growth of industrial profits, indicating that new growth drivers are increasingly shouldering the burden of development. Exports of green products such as electric vehicles, lithium-ion batteries, and wind turbine generators and their parts increased by 77.5%, 50.4%, and 45.2% respectively. Capital investment in frontier fields like artificial intelligence and humanoid robots saw the transaction value grow by 45.5% year-on-year. The business vitality index for technology-innovation-driven enterprises rose by 8.1% year-on-year. Industrial development is accelerating its shift towards higher-end, smarter, greener, and more innovative models, with continuous new achievements in cultivating new quality productive forces.
Observations from foreign media, such as "the boom in the application of China's clean energy technology is creating economic value" and "robust demand for AI-related equipment is driving China's foreign trade along a strong trajectory," are vivid reflections of China's accelerated development of new quality productive forces.
The overall improvement in domestic demand has created favorable conditions for sustained economic growth. Promoting an economic development model that is more led by domestic demand, driven by consumption, and characterized by endogenous growth is a strategic choice China has made based on new changes in its development stage, new situations in the international environment, and a balanced consideration of the present and the long term, as well as domestic and international factors. In the first quarter, total retail sales of consumer goods grew by 2.4% year-on-year, fixed-asset investment turned from negative to positive growth, and the domestic demand market continued to develop in depth and breadth. At the 6th China International Consumer Products Expo held in Hainan, a series of global debuts, Asia-Pacific premieres, and China first-show products were unveiled, continuously burnishing the "Shop in China" brand, with the advantage of a super-large market consistently empowering economic development. Some US media outlets suggest that China is transitioning towards a composite growth model, a shift that not only benefits China itself but also provides a reference path for global economic growth.
Amid profound adjustments in the global economic landscape, China consistently adheres to high-standard opening up, creating broad opportunities for the world through its own development. A series of opening-up measures have been intensively implemented, including the full island customs closure operation of the Hainan Free Trade Port, amendments to the Foreign Trade Law to align with international rules, and the expansion of the Catalogue of Industries Encouraging Foreign Investment. These actions are driving improvements in both the quality and scale of trade cooperation. In the first quarter, the total value of China's goods trade imports and exports exceeded 11 trillion yuan for the first time in the same period in history, maintaining double-digit year-on-year growth, with the quarterly growth rate hitting a nearly five-year high. Specifically, China's imports and exports with countries participating in the Belt and Road Initiative accounted for 51.2% of the total value, trade with Africa grew by 23.7%, and trade with ASEAN, Latin America, the European Union, the United Kingdom, and other APEC economies all achieved double-digit growth. The radiating and driving effect of China's "world market" continues to benefit the globe. A China committed to high-level opening up will remain a stable support for the world economy as it navigates challenges.
The year 2026 marks the beginning of China's 15th Five-Year Plan period. China's stable economic growth provides a solid foundation for a strong start to this new phase and acts as a stabilizing anchor for the global economy sailing through storms, continuously injecting lasting confidence and robust momentum into global development.
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